Cleaning pet litter boxes is an unpleasant and potentially unsanitary chore. Consequently various"self-cleaning" litter containers are known in the prior art to facilitate removal of animal waste and reuse of the container. For example, U.S. Pat. No. 5,752,465, which issued to Page on May 19, 1998, relates to a pet litter holding device which includes a stationary base, a rotatable drum and a sieving panel which isolates solid and clumped litter during rotation of the drum. The waste material is directed to an exit spout adapted to hold a disposable plastic bag. The following United States patents disclose other similar devices for filtering and disposing animal waste:
U.S. Pat. No. Issue Date Title Inventor(s) 5,507,252 April 16, 1996 Waste Separating Cat Ebert Litter Box 5,749,318 May 12, 1988 Self-filtering Litter Barbot et al. Box for Animals 5,752,466 May 19, 1998 Clumping Litter Liner- Lundeen et al. Sieve System 5,799,610 Sept. 1, 1998 Self-Filtering Litter Poulos Box for Pets
Although many reusable pet litter containers facilitate filtering and removal of waste material, they do not eliminate the need for pet owners to periodically clean the walls or sides of the container. Adherence of clumping-type pet litter to container walls is a problem which is common to both conventional and self-cleaning devices. Most cats tend to urinate on or near the end walls or in the corners of litter containers, which are usually rectangular-shaped. Typically it is necessary to use a litter scoop or some other instrument as a scraper to dislodge clumps of pet litter from the container walls. This is an unpleasant job and often results in pet litter plugging the sifter holes of the litter scoop. Moreover, a thin layer of wet litter remains on the container walls which retains odour and is unsanitary. Cleaning is particularly difficult if the container has a litter containment hood which cannot be easily removed.
The need has therefore arisen for a pet litter container which is specifically designed to prevent litter from sticking to the walls of the container.